Ageless Movies

Lately, Zach and I have been watching movies together. We talk about them all of the time too. All of them have been awesome so far. They are under the category of "adult friendly".

It started with Kung Fu Panda 3. Zach had seen it and wanted to watch it with me this summer. It was pure awesomeness!!!!! That was before I saw who voiced the characters. That day we ran out and got Kung Fu Panda 1 and 2. We watched them too. Also pure awesomeness!!! So Zach wanted to try the Hotel Transylvania movies. More awesomeness. Later, I found out who voiced the characters.

These two movie franchises have the following in common:

1. Strong stories
2. Important lessons
3. Well written stories
4. Relatable characters even in a small way
5. Funny
6. Dead Moms

Okay, the dead mom thing is very not awesome but it got me thinking. In a lot of kids TV shows the mom has died and the kids are being raised by a single dad. It also made me watch commercials more closely.

In the past, commercials about cleaning and parenting featured either a mom or both parents. These days, they are more likely to feature the dad. Some of them don't even mention a mom. It makes me think about why that is.

Dad's today are more involved. Great!!! But, then why is there a higher percentage of single dads in the media then in real life? Because it's safer to feature the dads. When it's sexist to feature women, it's safe to feature men.

Years ago a dish soap company featured a TV ad. "Women everywhere are throwing away their gloves". They received some backlash for the sexist wording. So they kept the same video and changed it to "People everywhere are throwing away their gloves".

I love how Hotel Transylvania talks about prejudice and acceptance. These are big things that are long term issues in our society. Kudos to Adam Sandler for these movies and teaching people about accepting those that look and act different from you!

The Shrek franchise was another whole-family friendly franchise. Disney movies tend to be whole-family friendly too. One example is Frozen. We watched Beauty and the Beast the day we picked up the newly framed painting Beauty and the Beast Falling In Love. (see previous post or wait until the "Home Gallery Tour" post).

Minions, Angry Birds, and others. There are a lot more movies in this category then there used to be. Production companies, writers, actors, and more have discovered that the key to a successful kids movie is one the adults can enjoy too. TV has also learned this lesson.

You enjoy it as a family, you can talk about it later as a family, and it becomes something you have in common. A shared positive experience. A dinner conversation topic once you get passed "what did you do today?" answer "nothing".

Please entertainment industry, keep them coming!!! Just start including Moms too!!! Yeah, that would be great!